


What Comes Next

by babywarg (morphaileffect)



Series: Ironstrange Bingo [23]
Category: Doctor Strange (2016), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Depression, Drama, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, M/M, Past Pepper Potts/Tony Stark, Recovery, Romance, dealing with a breakup
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-01
Updated: 2020-01-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:01:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22062232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morphaileffect/pseuds/babywarg
Summary: Tony falls into depression after his breakup with Pepper, locks himself inside one of his estates. No one can bypass his security codes, so he gets visited by someone whom electronic doors can’t keep out.
Relationships: Christine Palmer/Pepper Potts, Tony Stark/Stephen Strange
Series: Ironstrange Bingo [23]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1291997
Comments: 16
Kudos: 228
Collections: Fun, IronStrange Bingo 2019





	What Comes Next

**Author's Note:**

> Trigger warnings for depression and alcoholism. This is, ultimately, a story of recovery.
> 
> For the Ironstrange bingo square "Fake dating."

The whiskey glass escaped the loose grip of his fingers, and fell to the floor.

Tony waited for the familiar soft “thump” as the glass hit the carpet, its contents making a fragrant stain by his feet. It was his nightly signal that he’d had enough to drink.

He was just about to surrender to sleep, when he realized, there was no “thump.”

He opened his eyes.

The very first thing he saw was his whiskey glass floating in the air.

The second was the familiar outline of a sorcerer, stepping out of the shadows.

He blinked, waiting for the newcomer to say something first. The sorcerer didn’t oblige. Instead, barely moving, he carefully placed the levitating glass on top of the nearest table.

“If it’s a matter of life or death,” Tony slurred, “call my office in the morning.”

“I was alerted to the fact that the leader of the Avengers drinks himself to sleep every night and no longer reports to SHIELD.” Light-hearted, yet cynical. He sounded like a disappointed drama professor. “And has walled himself inside his Palm Beach estate, refusing to let anyone but his most trusted aide close to him. No one could bypass his security codes, so they called in someone electronic doors can’t keep out.”

“Who’s ‘they’?” Tony sleepily chuckled. “Fury would be banging on my doors himself if it was something important. Captain Rogers would be camped out in front of my house, holding a rally or hunger strike or something until I felt bad and stepped out. I know of no ‘they’ who would - ”

Oh.

Of course.

_They._

It was 10 PM. Happy was sure to be still awake, though off duty.

“Happy?” he said loudly, so the automatic intercom could hear. “There’s a wizard in here who can’t seem to get the hint. Care to get him out of my hair?”

 _“Yeah, sorry, Tony,”_ was the reluctant answer. _“Pepper told me he was coming and not to throw him out even if you told me to. Besides, let’s face it - not like I really can, right?”_

 _They_ got to Happy, too.

They.

Pepper and her new girlfriend.

\- the new girlfriend who, Tony vaguely recalls, has some tie or other with the magic man in his sitting room right now, but he was just in no shape to remember.

“I sense a conspiracy,” he pointed out, eyes narrowing.

“Not an evil one,” Doctor Stephen Strange assured him.

“Do I have to sic my suit on you?”

“You can’t,” was the matter-of-fact answer. “Soon after the very public disaster that was your birthday party in 2010, you built a failsafe into your suits, so that they’ll only defend, not attack, until the wearer’s blood alcohol levels are down.”

Tony bitterly smiled. “Pepper told you that, huh?”

“No, it was part of the PR defense that your company launched. I _do_ read the papers, Stark.”

There were other drinking glasses in the vicinity. Tony didn’t even have to get up to retrieve them. He picked one up off the floor.

Also nearby was a bottle of arrogantly old and obscenely expensive whiskey. Tony uncorked it and poured a shot into the unwashed glass.

Strange watched his every move like a hawk. “Alcohol solves nothing, you know.”

“It’s seen me through many losses.” Tony’s drowsy, unsteady hands struggled to stopper the bottle again. “It’s going to see me through this one.”

He was putting the glass to his lips, when the glass floated out of his hand.

Then landed in the sorcerer’s hand. Nary a drop of precious whiskey was spilled.

Tony grunted. “So she doesn’t even trust me to know my limits,” he muttered.

Instead of magicking the liquor away, or setting the glass down again, the sorcerer drank it all in one gulp.

He made a small sound of appreciation for the flavor. Then he held up the glass to make a show of inspecting it.

“It’s not you she doesn’t trust,” Strange said, still examining the glass.

***

They were still co-workers - or, rather, he still depended on her. She still ran his company, paid thousands of workers all over the world, made sure his innovations fell into responsible hands.

So they still had to communicate every day, and they had to be civil about it.

He didn’t leave his estate. Didn’t talk to people. But he had to talk to her. _Needed_ to.

Hearing her voice for the first time in a day always sent Tony’s heart leaping. But the longer they talked, euphoria steadily descended into despair.

And as they talked, Tony craved alcohol more and more. Or anything, really, that could stop him from hitting rock bottom.

He tried his best to keep each exchange to under 3 minutes. If they had much to talk about, he split up their convo into multiple short calls, to be spaced out in the course of a very long day.

It was for the best. He didn’t want to break in front of her. He didn’t want to upset her by being broken.

“Thanks for sending Nanny McPhee over, by the way,” he said in a light-hearted tone. “We’re having loads of fun.”

 _“I’m sure you are,”_ Pepper Potts said from an office in Michigan. She must have been displeased that they were no longer talking shop all of a sudden, but she must also have been used to it.

“I mean it,” Tony pursued. “He’s a hoot. Plus, he knows how to hold his liquor. Real boyfriend material.”

One of her eyebrows rose. _“ ‘Boyfriend material’...?”_

“Yeah.” Oh, that pushed a button, that did something. “What? Shocked that I found someone to replace you so soon?”

Her face set. On the screen, it looked more sad than angry.

_“Don’t joke like that, Tony. I hate it.”_

_I know, darling._ “I’m not joking! He's an interesting guy. I bet that under all that stuffy fabric, he’s not entirely bad-looking. I’m considering asking him out.”

She was about to ask. He knew it. She was going to ask and she was going to be sorry, because he was going to throw nonsense at her until she realized he wasn’t being serious, after all.

But she had become too smart for that. Dammit, she knew him too well. _“Tony,”_ she sighed heavily. _“You know I just want you to be happy.”_

_If you did, Miss Potts - if you really did - you wouldn’t have left me._

“Not to worry about that, Pep.” Still sounding blithe, the remnants of the day’s hangover keeping him numb for a little while longer. “I am the master of my own pleasure.”

***

“...and that is the fascinating tale of how the Sinag reactor works.” He looked at Strange, and saw the man still listening intently. “Since you asked.”

Strange _had_ asked. But Tony had been expecting Strange to fall asleep after the first few sentences.

He did not.

He hung on to every word, asked questions at all the right times, and seemed to remember every single bit of information.

It was only at the end of his narration that Tony realized that he hadn’t taken a sip of his drink in an hour.

Oh, clever.

Getting him to stop drinking by getting him to _talk_ instead.

Tony was, surprisingly, fine with being fooled like this.

He took another sip of gin, just to wet his lips and un-parch his throat from all the talking. But he didn’t want to drink much more. He got a mild shot of adrenaline from talking about the Sinag reactor - one of the more obscure early inspirations for Stark Industries’ arc reactor tech - and he didn’t want to mess it up.

Tony felt like he was in college. Weirdly. Twenty years younger and brimming with energy. Trading words with someone who could _keep up_.

Strange could be impatient, sure, and snarky as shit, but Tony also found him easy to talk to.

It was either he just had this talent for opening up people, or he was using his magic on Tony.

\- which was a prospect he disliked thinking about, but was a bit too buzzed to care about at the moment. Maybe he could bring it up later.

“I don’t know what it is about your face that makes me want to throw useless information at it,” he unthinkingly remarked.

“ ‘Useless’? “ Strange grunted. “We all know different things. I can’t expect you to know about the things I do.”

“Really? But we both know about Brian Jones knowing how to play more than 60 instruments, and ‘A Chorus Line’ opening in Schubert Theatre in 1975.”

Strange grinned. “Yeah, I mean - everybody knows that, right?”

A chuckle escaped Tony.

Strange was a pleasant distraction.

When he wasn’t being a sanctimonious asshole.

Or when he wasn’t asking personal questions.

He really was a great drinking buddy...which worked out well because he was up front about him being there so that he could keep an eye on Tony’s intake - strictly as a doctor.

And so Tony didn’t have to drink alone. Strictly as someone who gave a shit.

But Tony supposed personal topics were part of the bargain.

“You must miss her.”

Tony looked at Strange, glaring without meaning to.

“How would you know, Doc?” he challenged. “You ever lost anyone you thought you’d die without?”

It took a while before the good doctor could answer.

“Never. But I know the feeling. Of something so important and so valued being there one second, and gone the next. Grief is too weak a word for it. It’s as if a huge part of you has been torn out.”

“The difference, Doc, is that Pepper isn't _something_. She’s _everything_.” It didn’t hurt to speak, but Tony knew the pain was on its way. It always was, whenever he talked about her. “Life without her...”

“Is still life,” was the gentle interruption. “A very good friend of mine told me that once...that even after the most important thing in your life goes away, there are other things that can give your life meaning.”

“Like what?”

There was another pause from Strange. Tony took a moment to appreciate the snarky Doctor in his silence. There was barely anything for people who didn’t know him to like when his mouth was open. But when he was silent and thoughtful and still, like this...

He seemed almost delicate.

Tony felt it was a privilege, seeing him like this.

“Like,” Strange carefully said, “what comes next.”

***

“Enough of that. How are you and whatsername. Christine?”

Pepper looked up from the documents she was skimming through. Her face was immediately guarded.

_“I’ll only answer that if you really want to know.”_

He feigned innocence. “What do you mean? Of course I really - ”

 _“Tony,”_ Pepper coldly followed up, _“the last time we talked about Christine, you flew into a rage over something completely unrelated - “_

“It wasn’t _completely_ unrelated...”

 _“ -_ cronuts _, Tony. You were rambling about cronuts, which had been out of circulation since I dunno, the last_ decade _\- “_

“What. Are you sure that’s how it happened? Who _talks_ about cronuts these days?”

 _“ - and then you ended our call, then Happy told me you drank all the way to next morning.”_ Pepper shook her head and sighed. _“I won’t put us through that again, so please don’t.”_

She had been through so much with him.

Was still going through so much.

“I really.” He spoke slowly, leaving space for his own sincerity. “Want to know.”

But even as he spoke, he was surprised at himself.

He really did want to hear about Pepper’s new girlfriend.

He wanted to hear that she was happy. That Pepper was happy. That they were happy together.

But it used to hurt, didn’t it? Hearing about Pepper’s new life without him used to be something that caused pain, tore through the numbness that alcohol afforded.

It used to be intolerable. Excruciating.

What had changed?

 _“She’s,”_ Pepper reluctantly answered, _“well. Thank you for asking. She’s flying off to a week-long seminar in Monaco. I’ll be in the area for the MOA signing with Coleridge, so we may get to spend a whole day together.”_

She was looking forward to it. The wistful smile on her lips said so.

The pain was still there. The pain of not being the reason for that beautiful smile. When he had been the reason for so many years.

But it was okay. For a change.

It was okay.

“I’m glad for that,” he softly said. And meant it. “Hey, if you need me to pull a few strings to cut that seminar short by one, two days...”

_“How are you and Stephen doing?”_

Tony froze.

It had been a joke, but...she had taken what he had said to heart.

He and Stephen.

Stephen, his drinking buddy.

His occasional therapist and nursemaid.

The person whose nightly presence (and nagging) (and obnoxious tendency to control the amount of liquor he imbibed) he had come to look forward to.

The man he had told Pepper he was thinking of seeing.

Stephen and he.

The lie that could stretch on _just a bit further_ , and cause harm to no one.

“Stephen and I,” he said slowly, “we’re in our early stages, you know? Adjustment phase. Still feeling our way around each other. But it’s going well.”

Pepper’s smile brightened.

 _“You seem...better,”_ she remarked. _“He must be a good influence on you.”_

“Yeah.” _You know who else was a good influence on me? You._ “Last night, he brought over a stack of ancient secondhand vinyls. We played all of it over dinner and had a blast arguing over who was the better composer - Mozart or Sting.”

Pepper chuckled. The sound of her laugh flowed over him like cool water.

 _“We knew he was going to be good for you,”_ she let slip. _“The two of you have a lot in common.”_

That nebulous “we” again. The royal “they.” Tony had already internalized what that meant.

_“I like seeing you happy, Tony. I really do. It looks like you have a good thing going. Don’t blow it, okay?”_

“I won’t,” he promised. No making the same mistake twice. Even in relationships that didn’t really exist.

***

A constant visitor was something Tony had not known that he needed.

But someone who brought over vinyls, videogames (videogames?? Yes, and the man was a complete terror in Pool Hall Pro), munchies, stories and at one point a _puppy_ (found shivering in the cold outside the mystic house Strange was living in/guarding, already reserved for adoption by one of the younger sorcerers), was someone who knew exactly how to bypass Tony’s internal security codes.

Tony was becoming attached.

And it was unfair. He was vulnerable.

Strange had a goal: it was to bring Tony Stark back into the fold. Get him out of the armor of his self-isolation.

Every day, it seemed Strange succeeded in a new little way.

A few weeks in, Tony found that he had been tricked into not drinking past his limit. The man was creative, he would give him that: there would be distraction after distraction, until in the end, _he_ was the distraction.

If Tony was not inclined to speak, Stephen would open up bits and pieces of his life, just to get the conversation going.

He talked about medical school. His internship. That one “shitbag hospital director” who made his life hell, then made a pass at him, ending up with a broken rib and an eagerness to resign. His blessedly sparse lovelife. Christine.

(And man, did they talk about Christine. And Pepper. Tony found himself talking about Pepper almost every time Christine was brought up. Mostly, they reminisced about the good times. There didn’t seem to be a lot of bad times to share, except for the times when they treated their exes horribly.

(Was it helping to talk about even that? He hoped to hell that it was.)

And lastly, he talked about his sister Donna. His very first real loss.

It was difficult for him. And for Tony, it felt like the last seal broken.

His stories burned themselves into Tony’s mind, for some reason.

Stephen was no stranger to grief, too.

But being in this weird magical ashram or temple or something way over on the other side of the world forced him to confront his many losses. Recognize that grief was an essential part of growth. And one rotted in place, if one did not allow grief to transform them.

He shared what he learned about dealing with grief with Tony. Meditation, talk therapy, art therapy - all the tips, tricks, tactics that he knew.

The unforeseen side effect was that it brought them closer together.

Stephen kept a respectful distance from Tony. Occasionally, Tony thought he could sense _something_ between them, but he thought that was the (perpetually decreasing, per a strict weaning-off regimen) alcohol in his system talking.

At one time he thought sparks flew when their fingers touched, as he handed the man a wine glass. But that might have been wishful thinking.

Often, he found himself thinking about the “joke” he was playing on Pepper. What if it was real? What if he and Stephen _were_ a thing, and they weren’t just self-help guru and depressive patient?

What if they moved past grief together?

There was one way to find out.

“Happy, book two tickets to the nearest Hillary Hahn gig, please.”

 _“What? You’re going out? That’s great!”_ came the instant response. _“Uh...so wait, Hillary Hahn. Who even_ is _that?”_

Tony rolled his eyes. “Look, just Google her or something. That’s two L’s, and H-A-H-N.”

 _“Right. Give me a minute.”_ Happy clocked slower response times than Pepper did. Tony loved the guy, but if he was presenting himself as Pepper’s replacement as Tony’s go-to person, he needed to pick up the pace. _“Okay. Violin, okay. Do you mean, uh, ‘nearest’ as in, geographically or...”_

“ ‘Nearest’ as in, time-wise. The next time she plays. I don’t care if it’s at a private event or at a concert hall, I wanna be there.”

Happy took a few minutes. Then returned with _“Uh...Tony, the next booking is three days from now...in Reykjavik...”_

“Great! Then we’re going to Iceland.”

The ambiguous “we.” He was using it for himself again.

It made Tony smile to realize it.

_“ ‘We’? If I’m getting the private jet, Tony, I’m going to need two names. I’m still your head of security. And please don’t say the other person is me, because I know jack about violin music.”_

“Don’t stress about it, Happy. Put the other one down for Stephen Strange.”

 _Doctor,_ a familiar voice in his head corrected. Tony chuckled.

“I mean _Doctor_ Stephen Strange.”

 _“Doctor Strange?”_ Happy paused. _“Is this a joke, Tony?”_

“No.” Not a joke. For once. “And you know where my best tux is, yes? Please make sure it’s ready for our date.”

 _“D-date,”_ Happy stammered. _“Y-yeah, of course. No problem.”_

***

There was, of course, the chance that Stephen wouldn’t like being ambushed for such an expensive, exclusive date.

But it was going to be the first time Tony was stepping out into the world again after weeks of moping in luxury. He wouldn’t dare refuse it. It would be the ultimate admission that he had finally achieved his goal.

Stephen agreed without a fight. Good. He even offered to portal them both over to Reykjavik for a faster and more carbon emission-friendly way to travel, but Tony refused.

”I want to spend as much time with you as possible,” Tony found himself admitting. “Get your fine wizard ass into my jet so I can have it for five extra hours.”

“We can just hang here for five hours, then portal over. No time lost,” Stephen argued. Of course.

“I know it’s not exactly practical, but will you just let me do this?”

A pretend-exasperated sigh. “Fine. Wasteful and expensive and possibly terminally awkward, but let’s do it your way.”

“We _are_ going to do it my way, Stephen, and we are going to _like_ it.”

Five hours trapped together in a luxury (and carbon emissions-free, thank you very much) jet turned out to be not as miserable as Stephen had theorized. It was much like spending time in the estate. They chatted about all sorts of things, tossing random trivia back and forth until Tony noticed the air stewards looking at each other and rolling their eyes at how much geek talk was going on.

Would they ever run out of things to talk about? Tony doubted it, somehow.

And it was simply a lot more _fun_ doing this with Stephen in public. With people watching. Witnessing how clever they were and how good they looked as a pair.

If he was going back out into the cold stare of this judgmental world, he was glad Stephen was holding his hand through it.

Figuratively. Of course.

And the concert was sublime. Happy got them great seats, and Stephen was mesmerized throughout the whole thing.

And in the end, as they were stepping into the limo that was going to take them to a fancy hotel where they would be spending the night (in separate rooms, of course), he asked Tony, “You chose Hahn because I mentioned that I liked her stuff, didn’t you.”

Tony grunted. “Don’t get cocky. We’re going to a Guns N’ Roses reunion concert next.”

Stephen smiled.

“There’s a ‘next,’ huh?” he remarked. “Looking forward to it already.”

Somehow, he made the words sound sweet.

And somehow, Tony found himself leaning in for a kiss.

A kiss that wasn’t turned away. But wasn’t exactly returned, either.

A tense silence lay between them. Stephen seemed to be searching his eyes for an explanation.

“Oh,” Tony muttered softly. “Whoops.”

_My lips slipped. It was a mistake. I’m sorry. Please let this not ruin our friendship. Please don’t stop coming by. It won’t happen again._

All these words in his brain raced each other to get to his mouth. What slowed them down was Tony being mortally afraid of any one of them coming out wrong.

Or, God forbid, smushed all together, into something ridiculous, like _Lips slipped mistake sorry come again_.

But faster than any verbal error, Stephen leaned forward and put their lips back together.

And this kiss lasted longer. Might have been a little less tentative. Might even have had a little bit of tongue.

“Whoops, my fine wizard ass,” Stephen grumbled as they pulled apart.

Tony didn’t need any alcohol. He felt heady. Intoxicated.

Only one hotel room was used that night.

***

Tony already knew how the next day's chat with Pepper was going to go.

_“So? How did Iceland go?”_

_“I’m not sure. I guess I’ll know when I hear from him again, whenever that is.”_

_“Oh, Tony. You blew it, didn’t you?”_

_“No, miss smarty-pants, I'm just pulling your leg. We spent the night in Reykjavik and the sex was mind-blowing, thank you for asking.”_

_“Oh. Oh, wow. I -- congratulations?”_

_“You remember that across-the-board bonus you proposed? Yeah. Implement it.”_

_“_ That _good, was it?”_

_“Better, Pep. I needed this.”_

At a moment of hesitation that evening, Stephen had confessed that he liked Tony. From the start. From even before Christine and Pepper mentioned in his presence that they were worried for Tony.

“He needs help,” they’d told him. “Someone he’ll listen to. He doesn’t deal with his feelings very well alone.”

And he immediately volunteered. At _great personal expense_ , he emphasized. Being master of the New York Sanctum was a 24/7 job. Yet he committed a minimum of an hour every night just to see Tony at his estate.

To care for him. Be there for him. Help him to his feet.

“You’re a stalker,” Tony sleepily pointed out.

Stephen smiled wryly against the back of Tony’s shoulder. “Definitely some kind of sexual predator at this point,” he joked.

“Just for the record - did you use any kind of magic on me?”

“For the record, no. You were heartbroken. Vulnerable. That wouldn’t have been fair.”

“You mean you really _were_ just there for me? What, in case I needed a rebound?”

“No. Because you needed a friend.”

Tony huffed. But any upcoming snark was stifled by Stephen hugging him closer from behind.

“...Stephen.”

“Hmm?”

“You once said we could find meaning in what comes next. Are you what comes next?”

Stephen was silent.

“If you are,” Tony followed up, “that's something I can work with.”

Tony sank deeper into that warm embrace, let it cover the hole inside of him that had been filling up for weeks.

**Author's Note:**

> No such thing as a "Sinag reactor." But wouldn't it be fun if there were??


End file.
